Planet Zoo 2 lands later in 2026 with new animal types and a focus on conservation

New species, a reservation building mechanic, improved simulations, and much more are here with Planet Zoo 2

Frontier Developments announced the first Planet Zoo back in 2019, expanding its management games selection that had players building and managing an animal-centered park. Now, it's time for the sequel. The studio today officially confirmed Planet Zoo 2 is incoming later this year, and it is touting a whole lot of new additions like new species, a reservation building mechanic, improved simulations, and much more. Catch the game's first trailer above.

First off, on the animals front, Frontier is bringing in fully aquatic species for the first time, letting players bring in and take care of fish, sharks, turtles, and more species. This will require the building of aquariums to offer visitors underwater views while also keeping track of filtration systems and diving teams for animal care.

Players will also be able to build fully customizable aviaries featuring barriers, support poles, and dynamic mesh covers, all to house the new bird types that can fly freely around their habitats.

"Discover and fill your zoos with a diverse roster of animal species, each with their own needs and behaviours," says the studio. "New faces join familiar favourites like the African Lion and Western Chimpanzee to create iconic zoo rosters in jaw-dropping detail, from high-fidelity fur, feathers and scales even through to authentic breathing and sounds. The natural world has never felt so close to home".

Next, wildlife reserves seem to be the biggest addition to this release. Players can participate in global conservation projects to release their animals directly into reserves, giving research back in return. These can be designed by the player too, which come with a large amount of space for customization.

The studio is touting improved building mechanics with a blueprint system as well as major zoo management improvements too. Moreover, four new scenery themes will be joining the five themes available in the original game.

Planet Zoo 2 is coming out on PC, Xbox Series X|S, and PlayStation 5 on October 13, 2026, with a $49.99 price tag for the standard edition. Anyone who pre-orders the title will also receive several in-game goodies for decorating their zoos too. Below are the minimum requirements for PC players:

OS: Windows 11
Processor: Intel i7-8700K / AMD Ryzen 5 3600
Memory: 16 GB RAM
Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2060 (6GB VRAM) / AMD Radeo RX 5600XT (6GB VRAM) / Intel Arc A750 (8GB VRAM)
DirectX: Version 12
Storage: 40 GB available SSD space

Frontier will have more to share about the game soon. The studio will be showing off Planet Zoo 2 at Wholesome Direct on June 6 and the PC Gaming Show on June 7.